Louisiana Here We Come

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Our next stop was to be somewhere in the New Orleans or Baton Rouge area. The campgrounds that are in either of these cities weren't looking all that appealing to us so we picked Lakeview RV Park in Livingston LA. About 30 minutes east of Baton Rouge. 

Originally when we made the reservation, we were told they could only put us in the in a pull thru site. These are their most expensive sites and not close to the lake. When we checked in, Chris was able to get us into a back-in, off lake, full hookup site and for much of the week, it was a lake view site since nobody was blocking our view. Admittedly there isn't a lot to do in the immediate Livingston area but it would prove to be a convenient spot for some day trips. 

The View at Lakeview RV Park

We figured it made more sense to head to New Orleans over the weekend to avoid some traffic, so we went towards Baton Rouge one day. Our first stop was at Highland Park to play disc golf. Reviews of this course warned that a course map was needed, but we found that even with the map, we spent a great deal of time wandering around looking for the tees and then the pins. We are far from experienced, but most courses we have played had some sort of tee area with either a concrete pad or some sort of mat on the ground. The tees also usually had some sort of indication of how far and which direction the pin is. This park had 8 inch flat rocks flush to the ground and painted orange or yellow. Trust us when we say they are only visible when you are within 15 feet or so. 

After a good Cajun lunch, we went back and found the observatory (part of Louisiana State University) to do some geocaches nearby. Unfortunately there wasn't any program to check out during the week we would be in the area. We then headed into downtown Baton Rouge to wander around the state capital area. Fun fact: the Louisiana Capitol building is the tallest in the country. The building is an ornate art deco style. A few blocks away is the mighty Mississippi River. A little lake nearby had all sorts of big white birds perched in a tree. I am not sure but I think they were snowy egrets. 

Gardens Next to Capitol Building

Lower Details

Upper Details

Cute Sculpture Near Capitol

Beautiful Tree at Capitol Lake

Snowy Egrets (?) Perched Across Lake

We were approaching our milestone of finding geocache number 9000. Generally we have done some special cache for the big milestones. #8000 was a 60 foot tree climb and others have included Maine's oldest cache and Texas' most favorited cache. Unfortunately there wasn't anything in this area that looked to be "that" special, but we found one that we thought would be okay and headed towards the east to Pelican Park where there appeared to be quite a few caches along the trails. These would be needed in order to get up to 8999 before heading to our milestone.  The park was just about empty and the trails were actually quite nice. We were unable to get to two of the caches in the park because of standing water so we needed to find a couple more. The cache we picked - Mystery of the Holy Grail - was some big homemade thing in the side yard of their house. It was better than most, but we will need to plan out our 10,000 find with a bit more care. 

One day we headed towards Denham Springs to shop at Bass Pro. After shopping we drove around town heading to a restaurant Chris had picked out. This area had been completely devastated with flooding late this summer. It was quite evident where the water level had been based on the high marks left on the homes. We were lucky that the place we picked to eat hadn't been damaged and had pretty good food. A few tables of locals were chatting over lunch about what damage they had and it sounded awful. 

On Saturday we headed into New Orleans. We had talked with some locals at the campgrounds and they had suggested we park in the lot near Jackson Square by the Mississippi River. This worked out well as our starting point. We wandered for a little bit but decided to head to the Garden District first and then come back to the French Quarter later. We finally found the right place to catch the trolley. The car we were on was far from quiet. I expected an electric trolley to be without much noise except for the track noise. We thought it sounded like a badly running engine in the back of the trolley. 

The first place we headed to was Lafayette Cemetery Number 1. This is just like we pictured from movies based in New Orleans. The place is old and many of the structures are in need of repair. There was a team working on one of them and I suspect it will look great when they finish. This cemetery is still open to the general public. The more famous one in the French Quarter has suffered so much vandalism. That you can now only tour it as part of a tour group at the cost of $20 per person. Maybe that one had more famous people buried there, but this one would do just fine for us.

Cemetery Entrance

Fresh Flowers

After the cemetery, we did a walking tour around the Garden District. There are definitely some fancy buildings here. We even managed to find a couple geocaches along our route. And wrought iron is definitely prominently used for fences and balcony railings.

The trolley we took to get back to the French Quarter was a little quieter but still not what I was imagining. Guess that means we won't just be riding them aimlessly to see different sights. Chris had another walking tour picked out for here but we we getting hungry so we found a place that looked good and enjoyed our view of the people walking by as we dined. I tried an alligator po-boy and yes it pretty much tasted like chicken. After lunch we walked around and for the most part stayed where the crowds were large - partially from a safety concern but more from one of people watching.

Here Comes Our Trolley

The street performers ranged from odd to interesting. A group of 6 small kids with 5 gallon buckets nearly half as big as they were, were sitting in the middle of the street playing the buckets like drums and were actually fairly good. A wedding party was up on one of the balconies watching the crowds below them. The line to get into Cafe Du Monde was always very long and since I'm not a real coffee connoisseur, it seemed pointless to waste time even though this is considered "must do" when here. 

Street "Performer"

And the Band Played On

When we passed by Jackson Square a second time, there was a parade complete with a float. The Hare Krishnas were having some sort of celebration. They had a pretty good size police escort but in the half hour or so we watched, they barely went a quarter mile. For some reason they were handing out oranges. I suspect we could have come back with a bag full if we had wanted. The float and their costumes were quite colorful. 

Jackson Square

Hare Krishna Dancers

Float Pulled Along Route

There are some very beautiful buildings in the French Quarter as well.

Preservation Hall

We ended up heading out even before the sunset. I guess we enjoy being out in a forest a lot more than a congested city. And since we weren't there to be drinking as we walked the streets, our visit seemed to us to be just the right length. Maybe if we were to come back during Mardi Gras, we could be enticed to check out New Orleans again.